I Know Now What You Knew Then
by lightning bird
Summary: He's lost his best friend - again - and suddenly he's a dad. In other words, the Gary needs to talk.


** I Know Now What You Knew Then**

Captain's log, stardate . . . yeesh, I don't have clue one. Never really got the hang of dates in space. We'll say Day 5 since we left Kanopus Prime.

Hey, Avocato. It's me. Gary. I know you'll probably never get this, but I need to connect to my best friend and spilling my guts on video is the only way I've got until we figure out how we're going to get you back and back to yourself and . . . yeah. All that stuff. I get it now, finally. I know now what you knew then and I get why you acted the way you did. Back at the start, I mean, but it wasn't the start for you, was it? You started three years ago, when you first met me before I met you.

Yeah, okay, that doesn't make sense even to me even if it is the truth.

Listen, hombre, being stuck on a planet with nothing but pigeons for company and nothing to eat but prison rations and nothing to do but wait for my ride to arrive gives a guy a lot of time to think. Luckily, the past year or so of my life has given me enough material to keep my brain busy for a long time to come. That, and pigeons are masters at positive affirmations. Seriously. I've never gotten so many compliments before.

So, let's start at my beginning, back on the _Galaxy One _when you pointed that economy-sized blaster at me and I asked if you knew how to play cards. You dropped that gun like it was a hot potato and let me cuff you without a fight. It was the easiest arrest by a prisoner in history. At first I thought you might be intimidated, then I thought you thought I was insane and it might be contagious, and then I thought maybe you thought I was cute and you wanted to mingle as much as I did even though you hadn't been alone with nothing but robots for five years like I had. All I cared about was I now had a cranky battlecat friend who was willing to play cards and would be the envy of every furry back on earth. I didn't think too far beyond that. Didn't have time, really. But it took about a month alone on the pigeon prison planet for me to figure out that dropping your gun like that was a leap of faith – faith in a future version of Little Cato, faith in some faceless stranger who said he was your best friend and wanted to play cards.

See, that's huge. That's mind-blowing stuff. That's the kind of thing they write songs about. I'd write you one, but it would suck. I still might, just to make Little Cato laugh. Even back then I thought it was pretty sudden that you'd give me the Clasp and engaged trust mode, especially since your settings were all pointed to extreme killer badass, but I would have done anything – and I mean anything – to get off that ship for a day. I've never had someone give me a chance as quick and easy as you did and I didn't want to blow my shot at having someone intelligent and interesting around, but then, you already knew we'd be friends.

I didn't want to believe the Lord Commode when he said you'd betrayed me. I mean, the little weasel was tearing me limb from limb, yo, so anything he said was automatically questionable. Even if you had, it didn't matter, because you came back for me. Came back, kicked ass, and got us the hell out of that pit. Then you hugged me when I told you to as we were plummeting through the spaceport. That and attaching a robotic arm to my shoulder really sealed the deal. At least for me. Maybe for you, too.

I'm so glad you hung around. Granted, you really couldn't go anywhere since your ship got disintegrated, but you stayed and settled in and just became part of this mismatched squad. Team. Family. What I don't get is how you managed to keep quiet about it. Past you meeting future me, I mean. If I'd been you, I'd never be able to stop talking about it. More than normal for me. It must have been tough to live with, knowing you'd die. I mean, of course we're all going to die. Heck, I've died. A few times. You could be dead now, for all I know. God knows what Invictus is doing to you right now, but I've come to see death as a temporary state anymore. Anyway, Little Cato told me he told you how you'd die and who killed you, but not when. Even if you knew when, I don't think that would have changed anything for you. You were still going to save your son no matter what. Then you gave him to me to look after.

Trust mode engaged. Big time, pal.

He's a great kid, Avocato. You did everything right by him. Your own life choices may have derailed, you never told me how or why things worked out like they did, but you were a good dad. I see that every day in Little Cato. Oh, and, FYI, I've adopted him. Your son. Little Cato. He let me be his dad. Rental dad. Vice dad. Something like that. We'll figure it out once we get you back. I'm thinking you and I may have to get married because, hey, we have a son.

But it took months on the pigeon prison planet for me to see a lot of things and wonder about others. Maybe it was the robot-free setting that let me think. It can't have been easy, being second in command under that wrinkly prick. You said you did some terrible things and carried out some horrible orders. You told me you would have done anything he ordered, until you didn't. You paid a price. A big one. I could tell. And you're still paying it. Did knowing your son lived at least into his teens have anything to do with you defying the Lord Commander when he ordered his generals to kill their firstborns? Did that order have anything to do with you letting us take the Dimensional Key? I can't help but think the little moldy TicTac was trying to get you back for giving us the key, even though I don't know how you covered for us. Something tells me that was a tipping point for a lot of things. Guess Sammy was right . . . after a fashion. Time is weird, especially when you have too much of it like I did. Still can't believe that 'no tipping servers' rule for time travel. That's just wrong.

But, anyway, our Little Cato was free and healthy and surrounded by people to look after him. You saw that, back then. You knew he'd live. You knew you'd have a best friend and you even told me to piss off and called me trash, like friends do. And then when we met again for the first time, you dropped your gun and took a big leap.

You gave us every chance. So, I gotta wonder, Avocato - did we give you . . . hope?

Gary out.


End file.
